The 28-year-old, who made his international debut earlier this month, struck in the 44th over of Sri Lanka's innings to remove Thisara Perera, Sachithra Senanayake and Nuwan Kulasekera in successive balls.

Perera was caught for five at deep midwicket by Mike Hussey, who threw the ball in the air as he felt himself falling over the boundary and jumped back over the rope to take the catch.

Senanayake played and missed a full, straight delivery and was adjudged lbw for a golden duck, as was Kulasekera on the next ball in similar circumstances to prompt wild celebrations from Christian and his team mates.

Christian is the fourth Australian to take a hat-trick in a 50-over international after Bruce Reid (1986), Anthony Stuart (1997) and Brett Lee (2003), Stuart being the last Australian to achieve the feat in a CB Series, against Pakistan at the MCG.

Sri Lanka went on to win Friday's match by nine runs and make it to the three-match finals. They finished on top of the three-team table, ahead of Australia and India.

India thereby failed to defend the title they had won in 2008 at the expense of the hosts. The tournament was not played thereafter but reinstated this year.